Lau Korsgaard

Also: networking as a dedicated activity isn’t real.

Effective networking is just building real relationships. Friendships, co-workers, collaborators, partners. Shared experiences. That is where a network comes from

You can’t force it and going to GDC with that goal won’t work

Yeah, know the feeling. Just for design.

Healthcare CEO shooting suspect Luigi Mangione has connections to the videogame industry, claims to have worked on Civilization 6 Luigi Mangione has now been charged with the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.

The wild thing is that he was also an aspiring dev - apparently interned at Firaxis.

Some of us might know him 👀

The story is written:

Legit analysis

If you are curious about what we did to "make flying more fun" in our latest DLC of Avatar, then check this little thread.

Very nice little parkour system:

This looks like my jam

I can for sure recommend Phantom Spark - a vibe trackmainia that just feels super tight

Finally we have high fidelity realitme dynamic raytraced light in our games!

Let's keep "tall grass" as the only way to hide.

Huge shout out to @lukeplunkett.com for stepping out of the discourse and reviewing an ancient game like Star Wars Outlaws 🙏

WOHA! having worked on a bow and arrow game for four years, I must say, this idea looks super fresh!

Really? I hear everyone within Ubi talk about how much we lack animators and tech animators on our projects?

Oh wow. I have found it increasingly physically painful driving at night over the last 10 years. It has been one of those "am I being crazy, or is this a thing?"

YouTube video by Ubisoft Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora – Secrets of the Spires Story Pack Trailer

Secrets of the Spires, our second DLC to Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora dropped last week. While DLC1 was mostly a story extension, DLC2 adds tons of new gameplay and 3C features, especially around flying, so #gamedev let's talk shop, #gamedesign thread incoming.

so many studio closures and layoffs in the last couple years, and many of the groups that still exist are in their final round right now, and culturally the vibe among players mostly seems like "fuck devs. if they shut down, good". when there's nothing new to play they will not amend this position

Yes! Ada, our fantastic Associate Director is streaming the Avatar Frontiers of Pandora if you are curious about the new DLC

And it is not that I feel this controller is better than let's say a Dualsense - it is just that it is so damn reliable.

So to conclude: A good traversal experience in games is more than the classic 3Cs (camera, controls, character), it is also crafted by the SPACE you move in, the ACTIVITIES it offers and the FANTASY it creates.

End of long thread

We did one more thing that is worth calling out: we doubled down on the fantasy of a personal bond to an animal. We added lots of small flavor animations and voice lines where the player character and mount reacts and responds to the contexts around them. Players have received this very well.

Smash also plays a key role in giving you micro distractions. Instead of airspace and ground being separate spaces, smash it opens a full range of open world gameplay and meaningful exploration. Defeat enemy installations by smashing ingredients, Loot by smashing containers, harvest by smashing pods

We want the player to ask themselves "what more can I smash?", "what places can I launch myself to?". Especially "Launch" is especially a skill that allows player expression. You can do cool stuff like, launch yourself in air, shoot a helicopter and land on the ikran again.

It was very important to design both of these skills as general "verbs" - not abilities to solve specific problems. We do onboard the skills on the main quest, and they both play a key role in moving the story forward, but they are broader than that.

On the core controls we only added a few new critical skills that open up the toolbox for what the player can DO in the air. The "smash" ability lets you hammer into things and destroy them, and the "launch" ability is an in-air dismount that just launches the player forward in air.

We crafted a world for flying. The world team created a vertical mountain canyon region... It is essentially Manhattan with tall spire mountains instead of skyscrapers, canyon rivers instead of roads. You can still go all the way up and above things, but often flying around stuff is more efficient.

Gameplay footage of Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora showing various aerial gameplay moments. Jumping and catching the ikran in air, aerial fights, barrel rolls.

The team that worked on the mount on the main game still had done a really great job of selling the fantasy, but it poses an interesting question when starting on an aerial focused dlc: where do we improve without completely ripping things apart? So here is what we did:

The transition between ground and air also took tons of time, landing could take 20 seconds, calling your ikran and taking off would take even more. So you either fly or you don’t, not much encouragement to shift between the modes.

It is fun to fly near the ground among gigantic trees - but players will gravitate towards the path of least resistance, even if it is less fun for them. So if you need to go from A to B, then most players will just fly up above anything there could be in the way and go in a straight line.

Gameplay image from Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, where two ikrans are flying in a big open vista with no obstacles in the sky.

Flying in Avatar sometimes struggles in all these areas. Flying has a wing flap mechanic that boosts speed and drains stamina, but that is about it. No way to master it, no way to make it yours. While flying above the skies is exciting, it becomes hard to add any mid-level navigation or distractions

YouTube video by FoxPurple Parkour! #shorts #avatarfrontiersofpandora

So, to sum up: aerial traversal is great in Spider-Man because of expressive controls, active mid-level navigation, and micro distractions. I actually feel on-foot traversal in Avatar succeeds on the same parameters. Expressive jungle parkour in an environment full of dangers and opportunities.